


All Part of the Show

by enigma731



Category: Hawkeye (Comics), Marvel 616, The Avengers - Ambiguous Fandom
Genre: F/M, Hawkguy, hawkeye squared
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-28
Updated: 2013-10-28
Packaged: 2017-12-30 17:36:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,055
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1021476
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/enigma731/pseuds/enigma731
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Out of the pair of them, Kate’s never been the damsel in distress.</p>
            </blockquote>





	All Part of the Show

**Author's Note:**

  * For [samalander](https://archiveofourown.org/users/samalander/gifts).



> An early birthday present for [ samalander ](http://archiveofourown.org/users/samalander/pseuds/samalander) who gave me [ this song ](http://songmeanings.com/songs/view/3530822107858797625/) as a prompt. I hope you like it!
> 
> Many thanks to [ SugarFey](http://archiveofourown.org/users/SugarFey) and [ Frea_O ](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Frea_O) for cheerleading!

He gives Kate seventeen days to come back to New York.

(In retrospect 'gives' is probably a bit of a stretch since he calls at least once every day, but at the time it feels pretty damn generous to Clint.)

The first couple of times he leaves voicemails--"I was just wondering if you remembered to replace all the coffee filters you've been using and if you did, where did you put them?" and "Did you take the boomerang arrow? Because that one was definitely mine"--he honestly expects her to show up on his doorstep a few hours later, hand on her hip and ready to give him a piece of her mind. Anger would be a relief, almost, if it could just mean that she was here. She doesn't come back, though, just stays radio silent no matter how many trivial reasons he finds to call.

On the last day, he resigns himself to saying what he's been thinking all along: "Kate? Are you there? Look--I know I'm a disaster but could you just--just let me know you're alive out there somewhere?"

When she doesn't respond to that either, he decides he has no choice but to swallow his pride and ask Stark for tech help in finding her.

Kate _has_ been using her phone, it turns out, just not to return his calls. Which is something of a relief, because it probably means she’s still alive, but it doesn’t convince Clint that she’s not in trouble. The signal gives Tony’s robots something to triangulate, though, and the next thing Clint knows, he’s got a set of coordinates: a target.

There are roughly a million and one reasons why he shouldn’t be leaving town right now, not the least of which is the brother he’s not sure he can trust around his friends. And then there are the tracksuits. But neither of those situations seems to be doing anything to solve itself, and one more bad decision is a drop in the bucket at this point.

At least, he thinks, the threats on his friends might stop for a few days if he isn’t here.

* * *

 

Kate isn’t home when Clint climbs out of the cab at her place. The coordinates Tony’s found for her lead to a trailer on the beach, with peeling paint and a roof that’s mottled with spots of age and mildew. The only answer when he knocks on the door is Lucky’s familiar snuffling followed by the distinctive hiss of a displeased cat. The whole setup--the pink striped blinds, the potted plants--feels wholly unlike Kate, and suddenly he’s filled with a weighty sense of melancholy, the bitter aftertaste of yet another person walking out of his life.

He doesn’t have anywhere else to go, hasn’t even planned enough to pack a real overnight bag, so Clint sits down on the top step to wait for her. Big, bloated stormclouds hang on the horizon out over the ocean, and the air smells subtly of ozone. He spares a moment to wonder if he ought to find better cover, the pre-storm wind whipping through his hair, turning the waves a cold green, but he decides he wouldn’t ever be lucky enough to actually get struck by lightning.

She gets back just as the first of the big, cold raindrops are starting to fall, trudging down the little beach path with the damp sand sticking to her shoes and an unfamiliar quiver draped over her shoulder.

Kate stops short for a moment at the sight of him, then crosses her arms with a sigh. “Great. You’re here. What do you want?”

Clint stands in a rush, feeling off-balance like his body has suddenly realized that he’s dropped everything and flown to the other side of the country today. He runs a hand through his hair, trying to find some sense of equilibrium. “You weren’t answering your phone.”

“Seriously?” Kate crosses the distance to where he’s standing so that she’s right up in his face, the raindrops falling slowly and heavily around them, landing like little bombs in the sand. “You forget how to _breathe_ now?”

Clint blinks, honestly surprised by the force of her reaction. It isn’t like he’s expected her to fall into his arms, wouldn’t even know how to react if she _did_ , but he has no idea what to do with the fact that she doesn’t want to see him. “I left messages. I was worried.”

“Right,” says Kate, and there’s something that looks suspiciously like disappointment in her eyes. “Except all your messages? Were about you.”

She pushes past him and onto the steps up to the trailer, opening the door and crossing the threshold as the rain starts to fall in earnest, an unseasonably cool deluge like the clouds want to meet the sea. Clint’s shirt is sodden and sticking to him by the time she turns back over her shoulder, Lucky pressing his nose into her hip.

“Come on,” she says finally, a sense of resignation in her voice as she looks down at the dog. “Or are you just going to stand there dramatically and get soaked?”

* * *

Kate makes bargain brand macaroni and cheese for dinner, which is warm and edible and probably more than he deserves, so Clint chooses not to comment on the fact that it appears to be the only food on the shelves besides a box of Rice Krispies. It’s still raining outside, but Lucky is curled up at his feet, and for a few brief moments, it feels like things might actually be good.

“What are you doing out here?” he asks finally, when the food is gone and there are no other distractions to be had. He should probably leave now, he thinks, quit while he’s ahead and find a hotel for the night. But that would mean resigning himself to the fact that she’s chosen to walk out of his life, and he can’t do it, can’t resist the urge to poke and claw and tear at the ruins of their relationship until there’s absolutely nothing but hatred left.

Kate snatches the empty dish from in front of him, stacks it inside of her own and deposits both in the sink.

“Taking a vacation,” she says stiffly. “A vacation from not having a job.”

“You’re working?” Clint rests his hands behind his head, leaning back in his chair until the front two legs leave the ground a few inches.

“Yes,” says Kate, sweeping an arm around the trailer’s interior. “This is my job. Housesitting this place. And Mr. Starshadows. He’s the cat. Also washing dishes and wiping tables at the diner.”

He can’t help it; the image of Kate with an apron and a dishrag is so incongruous with everything he knows of her that he huffs out a short laugh. “Glamorous.”

“Right,” she snaps, leaning over the far end of the table to meet him at eye-level. “Coming from the guy who once shoveled elephant shit in the circus. What are you doing, by the way? Piss off any more people? Or are you just hiding from the world?”

Clint sighs, defensiveness flaring hot in his chest. “Trying not to get any more of my friends killed. Wondering if I needed to come save you.”

Kate crosses the room in three decisive strides, clearly furious, and for a moment Clint thinks she might actually be about to slug him, which he probably deserves. He flinches instinctively, which knocks his precariously-leaning chair off-balance, and he jumps to his feet in a clumsy tangle of limbs as it falls to the floor with a clatter.

That seems to be enough to bring Kate down from the peak of her anger, and she makes a noise of disgust instead. “You think _I’m_ the one who needs to be saved?”

“You’re the one who decided to drop everything and walk out on your life!” Clint protests, knowing he’s only making things worse. He can’t help it, though, can’t stop the bitterness she’s left in her wake from spilling over his lips. “You tell me you’re there no matter what and then you fucking _leave_? Tell me how that makes any sense, Kate.”

She freezes. “You _heard_ that? You were just pretending to be asleep? Figures, Barton.”

Clint curses inwardly, realizing he’s exposed his own bluff. He didn’t know what to say to her promise then and he still doesn’t now. “No,” he says lamely. “I mean, I _was_ asleep, just not--not right at that exact moment.”

“ _This_ ,” Kate spits, taking another step forward so he has to back toward the trailer wall. “This is why I left. Because you keep talking about wanting to save people, wanting to protect your friends. But the only person you’re really protecting is yourself. You’ve got half a dozen people--superheroes, even!--trying to get your back, but you’d rather shut them out and then be sad you’re alone.”

Clint stops short, a multitude of protests dying on the tip of his tongue. She’s right, he thinks, because she’s always right, because Kate’s one of the smartest people he’s ever met and pushing her away is just the latest in a lifelong series of terrible mistakes. It isn’t like he hasn’t _known_ that all along, but he’s been on a downward spiral for years, doesn’t know how to let her or anyone else reach out a hand and pull him back up.

“Okay,” he says quietly, when it becomes clear that she isn’t going to say anything else, that she’s done offering lifelines. “So I’m not here to save you. I miss you.”

She moves in such a rush that it takes Clint a moment to register that he’s managed to say something right. Kate curls her fingers into his hair and hauls him down to kiss him. This has been brewing for months, he knows, was every bit as inevitable as the next disaster in his life, and he gives himself over to it immediately, a raw sound of need slipping from his throat as he kisses her back. He should pause, he thinks, should remind her that he’s a catastrophe, that there will be consequences to this. But Kate only makes a noise of disapproval when he goes still, balling her fists into his shirt and pulling him closer again.

Swallowing down the last of his doubt, Clint lets his hands find her hips and lifts her to perch on the edge of the table.

* * *

“You said you didn’t want to sleep with me,” says Kate, much later, when they’re curled up in the bed that doesn’t belong to either of them, the sound of the rain and the waves making it feel as though the entire trailer might be underwater.

“Uh,” says Clint, because he realized that was a mistake roughly eight seconds after he originally uttered the words, and also because he’s fresh out of functioning brain cells.

“Idiot.” She kisses the fading shadow of a bruise on his jaw.

Clint shivers. “Does this mean you’ll come back home?”

“No,” says Kate, looking pained, though somehow the words don’t come as a surprise. “Not yet. I still need to figure some stuff out. And you can’t stay here, either. You need to figure a lot of stuff out too. A ton of stuff, actually.”

He nods, running his fingers through her dark hair like it might be able to anchor him. He feels the ever-present urge to push her, to beg her to come home and be the partner he needs but doesn’t deserve. This thing between them is wholly new, though, lying wrapped up in one another in contented silence. He finds that he doesn’t want to break it, is able to fight his latest self-destructive impulse into submission.

“Someday?” he whispers, though he’s not sure he’ll be able to stay strong if she says no again.

“Someday,” she echoes, her long fingers tracing the line of his shoulder. “Maybe soon.”

Lying in the darkness, Clint tries to convince himself that she’s one of the few people who means what she says, that the only way to bring her back is to let her go.

* * *

He leaves in the morning to the sun rising out over the ocean, the sky clear blue and achingly empty.


End file.
